Named after a class of Roman gladiator, the Provocator is one of the less conventional mobile suits in service today. Co-developed by IVECO and OTO Breda, it was not intended for series production, but to serve as a technology demonstrator. Due to political maneuverings within the Latinate Council, the Provocator was instead chosen to be the Latinate's new standard medium MS.

The Provocator featured a number of newly developed or improved systems (for its time). Most evident were its 'Scutica' upper arms and legs, which were capable of extending 50% beyond their original length and bending 90 degrees in any direction. While similar systems existed on other MS, this particular system was supposed to have greater strength and load-bearing capabilities for an given amount of power.

The 'Missaglia' armour was constructed out of special fibres, woven into multiple layers. These fibres were the same as the ones used in the 'Scutica' system; the armour plates were noticeably lighter than most other armour materials of the time. While it normally offered poor protection to kinetic energy attacks, its ballistic resistance dramatically increased when energized, without the penalties of heavy weight. The fibers re-aligned themselves on a molecular level, enhancing their rigidity and tensile strength.

The 'Cestus,' while normally functioning as a regular beam gun/saber, could be 'supercharged,' firing either a short-range scattering-beam shot, or a highly focused, high-intensity beam supposedly capable of penetrating an MS I-field barrier of average strength at ranges under one kilometer.

While not unique to the Provocator, it was also one of the first mobile suits to be equipped with variable-angle leg thrusters.

After the initial production run, it was discovered that the Provocator suffered from the 'wobblies,' instabilities in the upper legs, especially during periods of peak energy usage. Most pilots chose to lock down the flexible leg sections, making the feature superfluous. Even with this measure, the Provocator was not a particularly stable weapons platform, as energy was still required to maintain their rigidity. On a similar note, the 'Missaglia' armour was hideously vulnerable to high-intensity laser fire, which, more often than not, cut through the circuitry pathways embedded within the woven layers. This in turn deprived large armour sections of power. While the 'Cestus' weapon worked as advertised, this was at the cost of reduced power to its other systems, degrading their performance even further. It was also not as effective against later mobile suits with greater generator outputs (or pilots who chose to shunt more power into their mobile suits' I-field barriers, for that matter). In an effort to rectify this, the following production run had the upper leg sections replaced with a more conventional, rigid design. An appliqué armour kit consisting of cermet plates was issued to all units and a charging limiter/power governor was installed in the majority of 'Cestus' weapons. Finally, generators with greater output were introduced in the most recent production runs, along with heavier, more conventional 'Visconti' multi-layer armour above a thinner 'Missaglia' layer.

interesting concept design. i can understand the design for the arms being extemdable. more reach can be a good thing, but the legs....ehhh.....i dont understand the reasons for creating such things in the first place. but this is an opinion from me though

everything else is pretty cool, like the armor having better ballistic protection when charged up. and for what its supposed to be able to do it seems like its only major flaws in its design was not having redundant power relays to keep the armor charged (design flaws that would get engineers fired or worse...). the other flaws in design would be poweer, because this guy seems to be a power-hungry monster. im surprised such a flaw would be allowed to persist in a military unit (even if it werent meant for such in the beginning...it should have been corrected before the leg stabalization was).

these are just thoughts from a fellow mecha-artist/designer looking in and putting his thoughts into the history of things. please dont take offense or anything.

It's supposed to be a stinky design, but there was a lot of under-the-table wheeling-dealing and buck-passing between certain politicians and the contractors. Some of the council leaders were apparently majority shareholders via 'false fronts,' and it didn't hurt to generate new jobs (and votes) in their districts, either (and MS pilots be damned).

oh, im aware of this fact. i picked up on that from the getgo (which is unfortunate, cause it looks cool)

its just im also questioning what went through the designers heads in the first place....and pointing out on how the flaws that are apparent could have been fixed at the start of the whole thing. but i know and understand the political reasons that it got put into mass production (flaws included). i mean, that sort of thing happens IRL....i know, ive seen it.
but as flawed as a design that it has, it IS salvagable and has some good ideas. it just needs better execution

That's why they made lots of modifications in the following production batches. Being as it is, it would have been a bigger, more expensive logistical mess if they had to replace it with another model immediately, so the brass just had to grin and bear it.

Of course, there'll also be more money involved--someone has to upgrade the earlier models to the present standard. Intentional, perhaps?

My works are a mix of old and recent--I decided to put up my portfolio one piece at a time, rather than all at once. I also tend to work on stuff very erratically. The newest one that I finished colouring was the Totenbär, but the lineart was actually from last February!